A Rare Occurrence
by sdbubbles
Summary: Serena Campbell is hungover on Monday morning - by no means a rare occurrence. It just so happened that everything else occurring around her that morning was rare. Very rare. For the If You Dare Challenge.
1. 424 - Uproar

**A/N: So this is a bizarre little crossover I'm doing for the If You Dare Challenge. Each chapter will be a prompt from the challenge. The story is set in the present day in both universes; all will become apparent soon. Thanks to Katie for encouraging me to try this - I was and still am very unsure about the whole idea.**

 **The prompt I used for this chapter was #424 - Uproar.**

 **Sarah x**

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Serena Campbell yawned; she _had_ to start drinking like a responsible human being. She was a consultant surgeon, for crying out loud – if Raf or Fletch had come into work in this state, she would have their guts for garters. Swigging her coffee, she sat down at her desk and huffed slightly. It was on mornings like these that she wondered why on Earth she chose this line of work when she had so many other options. Having said that, she wondered every day why she married Edward and couldn't find a logical and reasonable answer for that, either.

There was a knock at the door. In came Raf DiLucca, her trusted registrar. "There was a call for you today. An older Scottish lady," he informed her.

"Who?" Serena asked, not in the mood for guessing games.

"Didn't say. I looked up the area code – oh-one-five-two-oh," he smiled at her.

"Raf, that's not helpful," Serena laughed impatiently. "You must know as well as I do that she could have called from anywhere from Achanashellach to Applecross to Lochcarron to Shieldaig. I went up there as a kid. Every village for about fifty miles has the same damn area code."

Raf chuckled lightly. "Tell me about it. Well, she said she'd get hold of you another way, so I'd get checking your emails if I was you!" he grinned, leaving to head back onto the ward.

Serena let out the breath she had held when she heard that someone from that area was trying to make contact with her; she had not been back to the north-west of Scotland since she was eighteen, nor had she ever planned on returning. Nothing tied her to the area any longer, other than seven years of education, and the struggle to pass two different sets of exams at once. Her friends had all thought she'd gone mad, but she didn't regret her decision in the slightest.

Serena sighed, and picked up her coffee in a paper cup, ready to head to her customary Monday morning meeting with Henrik Hanssen. Not that she disliked the man – though they had their differences in the past – but she did often find him difficult to decode. On the way up, she took out her phone and checked her emails, as Raf had advised, but there was nothing from anyone but Hanssen, who was reminding her to meet with him some time before ten o'clock.

The lift opened onto the fifth floor, straight down the corridor from Henrik's office. The sound of her boots on the empty corridor floor was echoing through her, more than it usually did. Shrugging it off, she knocked on Hanssen's door and waited to be beckoned in. While she waited, she briefly glanced at the floor; there she found a cat sitting at her feet. It had given no noise of warning as it approached her, and sat there bold as brass, almost glaring at her in defiance. She distantly heard Henrik's call to enter, but she was fixated on the cat. "Shoo," she said, waving her hands at the animal – but it did not budge.

Serena sighed. Animals never had been inclined to do her bidding. She remembered vividly a massive black dog when she was twelve years old, and to this day she could have sworn it wore an expression of amusement when she had attempted to turn it away from her.

With the plan in mind to tell Hanssen about the cat in the corridor, she opened the door and stepped in. "Henrik, will you please get someone to take that cat away? It won't move for me," she said upon walking into the office.

Silently, Hanssen moved around her and looked out his office door. "I can see no cat, Ms. Campbell," he informed her, throwing a confused look at her. Serena stared at the spot where the cat had been sitting. He was right – it wasn't there. She looked around the office, thinking it might have slipped in past her, but no. It wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"Oh, Merlin's beard," she muttered, stunned by the cat's disappearance, accidentally using language she had abandoned thirty years ago. Internally, she kicked herself, for she knew Hanssen had heard her.

"I beg your pardon?" Henrik asked, eyeing her with both concern and incredulity.

"Oh, don't you start," she snapped. "You were going on at Jesse Law about Odeon not so long ago. You're not the only one who can pick a phrase."

"Alright," Hanssen answered her evenly. "We shall get down to business then. As you know, Dr. Digby is-" But there was a knock at the door. "Come in!" Hanssen called, sounding somewhat impatient. It was Morven Shreve who walked in, looking like she would rather not say whatever she had been sent to tell them. "What is it, Dr. Shreve?"

"There's a cat in the AAU locker room," she breathlessly answered, holding her side. "It's not doing any harm, but it won't leave. Cara keeps trying to pick it up to take it out but it wriggles out of her hands every time. Nurse Fletcher wants to know what you want him to do."

Henrik glanced at Serena, who met his gaze with her nerves twitching. However, before Hanssen could address the issue at all, both Serena and Henrik's phones rang. She looked at the screen and informed Hanssen of who it was: "It's Ric Griffin."

"Guy Self." He didn't sound enthusiastic and Serena couldn't blame him; of all her colleagues, Guy Self was the one she liked the least.

"Hello," Serena answered the phone.

"Serena!" barked Ric, sounding like he was ready to throttle someone. "Why on Earth are there about half a dozen letters addressed to you all over my desk?!"

Serena hesitated before he answered, "I don't know, Ric. You'll have to excuse me," she added, for she heard two sets of footsteps, both heeled, approaching the office. She hung up, and so did Hanssen, when Jac Naylor and Bernie Wolfe burst into the office. "Where's the fire?" Serena half-laughed, hardly believing they had run all the way from Darwin and Keller respectively.

"Owls!" Jac exclaimed.

"Everywhere!" added Bernie. Her blonde hair was in her face, though she showed no other sign of having run up several flights of stairs; Army life made a woman fit, Serena guessed. "Never seen so many of them in my life! And they've dumped a load of letters in the Keller staffroom."

"Same on Darwin!" Jac professed. "All addressed to-"

"-Serena Campbell!" they two women exploded in unison.

"What's going on?!" demanded Morven, who looked instantly like she had just sworn at the top of her voice when she realised how she had just spoken to four consultants.

But Bernie and Jac weren't exactly reserved about matters, either. "Owls, Henrik!" Jac shouted again. "I've never seen anything-"

Bernie was next to interrupt. "They're not even _behaving like owls_!"

"And what about the cat?" added Morven, seeming a little panicked now.

Jac's head whipped around to stare at the junior doctor. "Cat?! What _cat_?!"

"On AAU, in the locker-"

"How did a cat get into Acute-" Bernie began, only to be cut off by Jac again.

"Owls, cats, in a hospital!"

"It's mad!"

"It's a health and safety-" began Bernie again.

However, it was Henrik who cut them all off at once. "Silence!" he ordered them. "Calm yourselves!" Once the three women quietened down, Hanssen proceeded to ask them, "Now, what is this about owls delivering letters addressed to Ms. Campbell?"

Bernie took a breath, her military calm returning to her at long last. "Yes, they're scattered across Keller's staff room."

"And nobody thought to take a letter with them?" Serena asked, one eyebrow raised as she pulled her gaze across the three women. Was this their idea of a joke?

"How were we to know you were here?" snapped Jac. "Anyway. What are we meant to do about the _owls_?! Patients are asking questions now. My aortic valve replacement is convinced he's going mad."

Serena rolled her eyes at their reactions; she shouldn't have expected anything different. "The owls have done their jobs," she told them sternly. "They'll go of their own accord. Dr. Shreve, just keep the cat in one place, please, though I doubt she'll let you take her out of the locker room anyway." Morven nodded and ran back down the corridor, leaving Jac and Bernie to share an exchange of looks that plainly asked if the world had just gone completely mental. "I think I know what's going on," she added to Hanssen. "I should have recognised that damn cat!"

Without another thought, she barged past Bernie and Jac, who both looked suitably exasperated, and ran to the stairs, trying to beat Hanssen down to AAU. What had happened was obvious. _Why_ it was happening was something Serena did not understand. Thirty years ago, she had elected to study medicine, to go away to Harvard, to build her life here, in this world. Why was that decision chasing her now?

Hurtling down the stairs, she found she was not half as fit as she once was. Her breathing was heavy and her legs wanted to stop by the time she was at the second floor. With a glance out the window, she saw what was freaking out Jac and Bernie; there were owls in the trees, owls on the cars, owls on the benches...no wonder the Muggles were taking notice. Who was desperate enough to get hold of her that they would cause this uproar to do so?

But the answer was downstairs.

And when she ran into the locker room, and locked the door after ushering Cara Martinez out, she faced the cat; she was bent over, clutching at a stitch around her waist she had gained from the physical effort of outrunning Hanssen, whilst hungover, down here. "Professor McGonagall," panted Serena. "What in the name of Merlin do you think you're playing at?!"

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 **Please feel free to leave a review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	2. 236 - Method To My Madness

**A/N: I've been working on this chapter for ages, and I'm sorry it took so long. I had to make up a song and a backstory and some original characters (thanks to two of my best friends for volunteering themselves to be my characters :D) and then life got hectic and...yeah. Sorry.**

 **I've determined that Serena started school in 1976, which means she joined Hogwarts just as Voldemort was kicking his antics up a notch.**

 **Again, this is in the If You Dare Challenge, and I've used prompt 236 - Method To My Madness.**

 **Thanks to everyone who has read and reviewed so far.**

 **Sarah x**

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 **September 1st, 1976**

Serena McKinnie stepped off the train, a young boy by her side. "Firs' years!" called out a rough and growling voice. "Firs' years, this way!" Serena looked around to see a man, at least eight times her height, beckoning the youngest of the alighting students towards him.

"Oliver," she said, "do you know how we're getting to the school?"

"Dunno," shrugged Oliver, a boy who had joined her compartment about eight hours beforehand, and without whom Serena might have died of boredom on the way up the road to what was quite plainly Highland Scotland. It was with caution that she scurried over to the huge, bearded man, with the rest of her year.

There was a babble among the rest of the children, and if there was one thing Serena could not stand, it was senseless, incoherent babble.

Finally, the man said, "I'm Hagrid. Yeh'll be gettin' to the castle on boats." Serena looked at Oliver in alarm. She had never been on a boat, much less in the dark and cold. "When yeh ge' up there, Professor McGonagall will meet yeh before yeh're all Sorted."

Serena internally kicked herself. Why didn't she ask her mother more about this place? And why had her mum never voluntarily told her about magic and Hogwarts and the fact that she, Adrienne McKinnie, was a witch?! What was here that she wanted to hide? It all sounded very dark and dangerous. What she had read of her school books described somewhat horrifying histories, and the stories she had heard on the train about a man named Lord Voldemort had been nothing short of terrifying. Was that the reason Adrienne had said nothing about this world to her?

However, she followed Hagrid anyway, trusting that she would not be led to harm this early into proceedings.

And before she knew it, she and Oliver were sitting with two other children in a small rowing boat, heading across what seemed to be a lake – or a loch, since they were in Scotland – towards a large castle. The boats, however, required no rowing, for they moved on Hagrid's command.

Oliver whispered in Serena's ear, "I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't a boat." Serena smiled slightly, but only to try and hide her nerves. A few months ago, she hadn't known this place existed. She hadn't believed in magic. She hadn't known her mother was a witch. She was at home, hoping she would get her first choice secondary school down in Surrey.

When asked, Adrienne said only that she had known of several people she had not wanted to know, and of several incidents that convinced her that she did not wish to remain in the magical world. Whatever that was supposed to mean, Serena wasn't sure if Adrienne had been exaggerating or not.

And yet here she was, climbing out of a boat onto the shores of a loch, on the grounds of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hagrid was leading them up towards the castle, which had its windows lit from the inside, and had gargoyles at the entrance. Darkness had fallen around them, for it was already autumn, even if the clocks still had nearly two months before they had to be wound back an hour.

A tall woman with her black hair knotted tightly into a bun, with a pointed hat on her head, waited for them at a set of grand wooden doors. Serena was silent as the woman waited for hush among the children. When all was quiet, she finally said to them, "Welcome to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I am Professor McGonagall. Before you join your classmates, you are to be Sorted into one of four Houses: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin," she told them, and Serena couldn't help but note the distaste in the witch's tone when she said the name of that last one. "Whilst at school, your House will be a family of sorts to you. You will learn with them, eat with them, spend free time in your House common room and sleep in shared dormitories. When I return in just a moment, you will follow me through the Great Hall and wait to be Sorted."

Professor McGonagall turned away and slipped through the doors, leaving the hoard of children alone to wonder what on Earth they were going to be faced with. "What's wrong with Slytherin?" Serena asked Oliver nervously.

"Not a clue," said Oliver.

A girl behind them piped up, "He Who Must Not Be Named and most of his followers were in Slytherin when they were at school." Serena turned around to find a short, brunette girl with bright blue eyes and quite pale skin. "Salazar Slytherin had an obsession with blood purity, as well. But they're not _all_ bad, I promise."

"Ugh, it's the Voldemort thing," huffed Oliver. "Voldemort, the one who's been murdering people and turning every magical creature he can find over to the Dark Side."

Serena smiled weakly but could say nothing; she internally hoped she was not in Slytherin. She had not even asked her mother what House she had been in at Hogwarts, so she had no way of knowing how likely it was for her to be a Slytherin – especially if it ran in the family.

The witch returned before any more could be said on the matter, and they were led into a massive room, seemingly without a ceiling. The night sky was above them, exactly as it appeared outside these walls, and the room was set with five tables. Four of the tables were lined with students, but the one at the top of the hall was clearly where teachers and staff sat. In front of that table was a stool, on which a grubby-looking and tattered hat lay.

The room fell silent; at first, Serena assumed they were waiting for the Headmaster, who sat in the middle of that top table, to speak, until she realised all eyes were on the hat on the stool.

To Serena's amazement and slight horror, the hat began to _sing_.

" _I was made by founders four,  
_ _Who each prized different traits,  
_ _You see, they could not agree  
_ _On who should pass through the gates._

 _They decided that I should split you,  
_ _Each into one_ _house out of four,  
_ _After I looked inside your heads,  
_ _And find what's at your very core._

 _Gryffindor, who loved the brave and the bold,  
_ _Or Ravenclaw,_ _who chose intelligence and wit,  
_ _Slytherin, who wanted ambition and cunning,  
_ _Or Hufflepuff, who just wanted them to do their bit._

 _Yet there came a time when it became too much,  
_ _For Slytherin and Gryffindor to bear,  
_ _For Slytherin accepted only ancestry pure,  
_ _While Gryffindor believed that unfair._

 _Since the day Slytherin left this school,  
_ _There's been a terrible rift,  
_ _Between the students of their houses,  
_ _That never seems to shift._

 _But now, my dear friends, I implore you,  
_ _Please don't hold onto that grudge,  
_ _Understand each other, or at least try,  
_ _Nothing is more dangerous than to prejudge._

 _These days, I worry that Sorting is unwise,  
_ _That it does much more damage than good,  
_ _For it separates you all before you know,  
_ _That together is how you ought to be stood._

 _But all the same, I will do my job,  
_ _Just don't let the tensions boil,  
_ _I'll split you into your four houses,  
_ _And hope I don't cause more turmoil._ "

Everyone in the Great Hall applauded the Sorting Hat's song, until the witch who greeted them at the doors stepped up once more, a scroll in her hand. "Now," she said to the gaggle of students, "when I call your name, you will come and sit on the stool. I will place the Sorting Hat on your head, and once you have been Sorted, you will go and sit down at your House's table." She unfurled the scroll and proceeded to call out, "Ackerman, Evan!"

Evan Ackerman sat on the stool and Professor McGonagall placed the Hat on his head. Apart from the fact that the Hat was so big it fell over his eyes, the process did appear to be painless. After about a minute of silent deliberation, the Sorting Hat shouted out, "RAVENCLAW!" Evan took the Hat off and half-ran to the Ravenclaw table.

"Ashloudie, Callan!" called Professor McGonagall. Callan Ashloudie followed the same procedure as Evan had done, though the Hat only took about twenty seconds to declare he was Sorted into Gryffindor. "Brothwick, Bran!"

Bran was also a Ravenclaw, and gleefully hopped to his table, patted on the back by a few of his new classmates. "Callaghan, Aoife" became the first Slytherin. The girl didn't _look_ too unpleasant, anyway. Serena tried the banish that thought from her head and concentrated on whatever she could instead. She missed a few of the students who were Sorted until she heard, "Fawley, Ophelia" become a Hufflepuff.

"Greengrass, Castor" and "Greengrass, Pollux" - obviously a set of twins, though they weren't identical – were put into Slytherin as soon as the Hat touched their heads.

Serena distracted herself by examining the Headmaster; he had, _I am eccentric, bordering on insane_ , written all over him. His long beard and hair were tied into a belt that held in his vivid violet robes, and his blue eyes glittered with somewhat mad-looking enthusiasm.

Then she glanced at the ceiling, which still resembled the sky, and tried to figure out exactly what the game was with that. It was blatantly obvious the Hall did indeed have a roof, or else they would have been shivering with the cold Highland night air, but there was no ceiling of any kind visible through the stars above.

"Le Marquand, Oliver," Professor McGonagall shouted out. Serena looked around to find Oliver heading up to the Sorting Hat looking like he would rather not. The Sorting Hat took over two minutes to decide that Oliver was a Slytherin. Appearing to be in a bit of a daze, Oliver removed the Hat from his head and hurried down to the Slytherin table. Now Serena actually looked at the whole table of students, there were a fair few who looked less than friendly. There was hooked-nosed boy of sixteen or seventeen, with long, lank black hair who appeared like he might curse the next person to cross him. Down the row, there was a girl who looked a bit like a toad, a year or two younger than the black-haired boy, who wore a simpering, sweet smile but Serena got the impression she couldn't be trusted as far as she could be kicked.

"McKinnie, Serena!"

Serena was rooted to the spot for just a fraction of a second, before her legs moved her without permission to the stool, and the Hat was dropped onto her head by Professor McGonagall. "Ahhh," a voice said to her, echoing inside her head. "Now, this one is interesting. You have all the talent and wit to go into Ravenclaw. Oh, yes, your mind really is something. But I see you're also quite brave, not one to back down in a fight. You'll work hard, too, I see. Hufflepuff loves a good hard worker. But you're ambitious. Oh, how you want to prove yourself. Quite capable of being more than resourceful. Sly, if needs be."

 _I don't want to go into Slytherin!_ thought Serena, with all her might and desperation.

"Oh, but you would do so well in Slytherin. You would do well in Ravenclaw, too, with a brain and a talent like yours. But you don't want to just be intelligent. You want to be the best. You always have, and I think you would go further than any Ravenclaw to get there."

 _You're mad_ , Serena accused the Hat. He had to be if he saw any Slytherin quality in her. _Utterly mad._

"There's method to my madness," chuckled the Sorting Hat.

Oh, how Serena hoped the rest of the Hall could not hear this exchange. _But all the Slytherins are dark wizards_ , argued Serena relentlessly. _I don't want to end up like Voldemort or anyone who reckons murdering people is an OK thing to do._

"Is that what they've told you?" laughed the Sorting Hat. "You know, there's more to Slytherin than that. Being in Slytherin does not put you on the Dark Side without a choice. Everyone makes that choice themselves, and most of Slytherin will do what's right."

 _Then why did they tell me most of his followers were Slytherin?!_

"Lord Voldemort is a direct descendant of Salazar Slytherin, so he could have been a saint and still would have had Slytherin's traits. His followers shared those traits, yes, but they didn't start life with the prejudices they exhibit now. Nobody does. These things are learned, and you're the sort of person who knows better. You can be a Slytherin and a good person, I assure you."

 _Are you sure about this? They don't look very friendly._

"You will find friends in Slytherin. Like-minded people. You could be in Ravenclaw, with a mind like yours, but your ambition and resourcefulness will serve you well in Slytherin. You will do better in Slytherin."

And before she could stop it, the Sorting Hat bellowed out to the Great Hall, "SLYTHERIN!"

Serena was left with no choice but to head down to the Slytherin table and sit next to Oliver, and watch the rest of her peers be Sorted.

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 **Please feel free to drop a review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


	3. 110 - There Is No Need To Shout

**A/N: Sorry for the delay. Life is hectic! The prompt for this was "There Is No Need To Shout" from the If You Dare Challenge.**

 **Thanks, as always, to everyone reading and reviewing.**

 **Sarah x**

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In front of Serena, where the cat had been sitting a moment before, stood a tall witch, with now grey hair – though it had been black when they had first met – emerald green robes and square rimmed spectacles. She seemed to have thought better of wearing her usual pointed hat in the presence of Muggles, though. It was just as well; Serena feared Hanssen might have died at the sight of Professor Minerva McGonagall had she not abandoned her hat.

Minerva drew her wand and waved it at the door, and Serena heard the lock click shut. "Serena McKinnie," Minerva addressed her.

"C-Campbell," stammered Serena. She was actually quite nervous; seeing the cat had been one thing, but to see the woman who taught her Transfiguration standing in the staff room of her workplace was another matter entirely. "I got married. To Edward Campbell. And divorced," she added as an afterthought. She did not wish Minerva, who was so disdainful of stupidity, to be led to believe Serena remained married to Edward. However, she thought better of telling her about their brief reconciliation.

Minerva looked much older than Serena remembered her; she had to be in her eighties by now. But she still held that demeanour that warned Serena against infuriating her. "I don't mean to be rude, Professor," Serena said, her voice stronger and more sure now, "but what in Merlin's name are you doing on my ward?"  
" _Your_ ward, Serena?" Minerva raised an eyebrow at her.

"Yes, _my_ ward."

"I see," the Professor said. "Are all surgeons so territorial?"

"They are when they deal with the crap I deal with every day," Serena answered. "Now, why are you here?"

Minerva sat down on the bench in the middle of the room, and gestured for Serena to do the same. Serena, distrustful of Minerva's intentions due to her unannounced and chaotic appearance here, remained on her feet, wish desperately that she had not left her wand locked in a box in her wardrobe for the past thirty years. Not that she would have a hope in hell of winning a duel with Minerva, but she would have a better chance if she was actually armed.

Minerva, clearly impatient with Serena's mistrust, sighed and rolled her eyes to the ceiling and back down. "I'm retiring at the end of this school year, Serena," she informed her. "But there is a branch of Muggle Studies I would like to introduce to the school before the end of my tenure."

"I am _not_ moving up to Scotland and living at Hogwarts," Serena instantly dismissed the idea.

Minerva raised her eyebrows again, and remarked, "Did I say anything about living at Hogwarts?" Serena allowed her that one, grudgingly. "Though we _do_ need a new head of Slytherin House too. Horace Slughorn is getting so old that the students are running rings around him every day."

"You're still letting him _teach_?!" Serena exclaimed. "He has to be kicking a hundred by now! And I thought Severus was the head of Slytherin, anyway."

"Hence why he shall be retiring at the end of the school year." Minerva's eyes were unusually bright as she surveyed the doctor in front of her. "Serena, how much do you know about the Second War?"

"Just that Voldemort was defeated," Serena said simply. Unlike many others Serena had never had an issue with uttering the Dark Lord's name. He was a bit of a psychopath, granted, and he was dangerous, but his name was just a name. How much more could there be to the matter? "I was eight months pregnant when rumours started flying after the Triwizard Tournament. Naturally I took my husband and my baby and took them away from it all. I'd lived outside the magical world since I left school. I wasn't about to go headlong back into that world only to get stuck in the middle of a war, while I had a baby to look after."

Minerva's gaze dug into her again, before she finally gave her reply. "Severus is dead, Serena. So are Albus Dumbledore, Peter Pettigrew, Remus Lupin, Sirius and Regulus Black, Mad-Eye Moody, Bellatrix Lestrange…all dead."

"I already knew about Pettigrew. Black killed him," Serena reminded Minerva, who instantly shook her head.

"No," she answered firmly. "Sirius Black didn't betray the Potters either. It was Pettigrew. It was Pettigrew who killed all those Muggles, and cut off his finger and fled, to make everyone conclude he had been killed in the explosion."

Serena stood there with her mouth open for a moment; when she eventually regained the power of speech, she said, "So the war got a bit out of hand, I gather?"

Though she was determined to hide it, the news that the people she had gone to school with, or whose family members she had gone to school with, were all dead shook her. "What about Oliver? Oliver Le Marquand?"

Minerva hesitated, causing Serena's heart to thump horrifically. He had been her best friend for years; only when she had left the wizarding world for good, at the start of the second war, had she completely left him behind. She had suffered one war and it had almost got her killed. She had been in medical school and in the magical world, working tirelessly in two worlds at the same time. It was a wonder she ever managed to qualify as a doctor, the number of Unforgivable Curses Bellatrix Lestrange and her husband and brother-in-law had fired at her, in the summer holidays, when she was under age and shouldn't have been duelling in the first place. The only reason she got away with it was because the Death Eaters almost killed her every time it happened, and it always happened well away from any Muggles anyway. There was something about her double life in the Muggle world that enraged Bellatrix. From the time she was fourteen, Bellatrix had sought her out every summer, and duelled her almost to death.

"Oliver Le Marquand is in St. Mungo's. Funnily enough, he was taken here to this very ward by Muggles who didn't know any better. Remus Lupin came and got him back to our world," Minerva explained. Serena narrowed her eyes, silently demanding an explanation. Minerva sighed. "In 1997, when He Who Must Not Be Named's Death Eaters came into the open, they attempted to recruit Oliver on the basis that he was a through and through Slytherin."

"Oliver would _never_ join the Death Eaters," snarled Serena; the very thought boiled her blood. "He always said they were lunatics."

Minerva glared at Serena for her interruption, before continuing, "He refused them. Repeatedly. He was close to the Order of the Phoenix, though not a member; he wanted to keep his family safe. But when Bellatrix Lestrange and Antonin Dolohov deduced as much, they hunted Oliver down. They tortured and murdered his wife and daughters before his very eyes, and then they tortured him. He fought them when they first attempted to harm his family, so they bound him. He was found two days later."

Serena's hand found the railing over the bench in the centre of the room; she had never doubted that Oliver would come through that second war unscathed. She knew he was charming and sly, a Slytherin to the core, though he passionately despised the Dark Arts. He was more than capable of eluding Voldemort and his lunatic following – or so she had believed. "Why has he been kept in St. Mungo's?"

Minerva sighed yet again. "He has what, in Muggle medicine, would be described as post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as severe depression. He cannot live alone without being a danger to himself, and there is nobody in his family left to take care of him."  
Serena's first instinct was to say she would take him. That she would be Oliver's keeper. But she couldn't; hadn't she learned that lesson already, with her mother? It didn't work that way, as much as Serena might want it to. Life was harder than that. Drawing people close didn't work if they were already where they needed to be. But that did not mean she could not visit him, rebuild their friendship.

The Professor seemed to realise the effect she was having on her former student, and so diverted the topic of conversation back to the original one. "Serena, I would like it very much if you would teach at Hogwarts for one day per week. I want students to study certain branches of Muggle medicine – for instance, how to clear a person's airway without magic. There is a certain point that I find we rely too much on magic, and it was made all too clear to me during the second war. Of course, I would also like you to teach magical medicine, too. A mixture of both is what they need to know."

Serena, stunned, could only say, "I have a job here. I can't abandon it one day a week."

But even as she said it, she marvelled at the idea of teaching Muggle medical techniques at Hogwarts. She relished in the idea of instructing them on how they could survive a crisis without magic. On the other hand, Serena hadn't touched her wand since 1995. She and Edward had given that life up when news broke of Voldemort's return to power; the Ministry of Magic might have tried to tell the world that Lily and James' son was a liar, but even Edward wasn't stupid enough to believe that.

"What about a Time-Tur-"

"I am _not_ messing around with time," interrupted Serena. "I have a daughter and a nephew to consider here as well."

Somehow, she knew she wanted to return. It was time. It was safe, and Ellie and Jason would be safe if she ventured into the wizarding world now. She wasn't endangering her family if she accepted this offer. However, she could not simply ask Henrik Hanssen for a day a week off.

How did Minerva expect this to work? Seriously? She had left the wizarding world for a reason, and it wasn't just be drawn back in twenty years later. "You come in here," Serena said, finding her temper and voice were rising, "after years and years, to ask me to go back to Hogwarts to teach? To disrupt my life, my colleagues' lives, my daughter and nephew's lives, to teach teenage brats how to do the bloody Heimlich manoeuvre?!" she yelled, finally losing her rag. "Do you realise I've not done any magic whatsoever since 1995?! I barely even remember how to Stun someone, never mind save their life!"

"That is not why you are upset," Minerva sternly told her. "And there is no need whatsoever for you to shout."

How could Serena have forgotten the infuriatingly strict calm about this woman? It had, after all, driven her mad for seven years straight. All the same, though, as Serena took a breath and calmed her wildly loose temper, she realised Minerva was right. The proposition – for that was all this was – did not cause that outburst. The fact that Oliver Le Marquand, a boy with whom she had grown up, with whom she had become best friends, who warned her against marrying Edward but did not force the issue, who stood by her side in every fight he could, was lying alone in St. Mungo's...that was what bothered her.

There was a knock at the door, and she heard the familiar voice of Henrik Hanssen from the other side. "Is everything alright, Ms. Campbell?" he called through to her.

"We heard shouting!" added Bernie Wolfe.

"Unlock the door, please," Henrik asked of her.

Serena turned and raised an eyebrow at Minerva, who was the only person in the vicinity capable of unlocking the door she had charmed to seal, since Serena was wandless. "I'd do as he says, if I were you," she advised.

Minerva silently took out her wand and waved it, wordlessly unlocking the door, the lock clicking open. The door opened, and there stood Henrik Hanssen and Bernie Wolfe, who, when their eyes fell upon Minerva McGonagall, wore dumbfounded expressions. "But Cara said there was cat," Bernie protested. "The door's been locked...how on Earth..."

Serena met Henrik's eyes and knew she had to come clean. He was the last person who was likely to lose his head when faced with the impossible, after all, and silence was his speciality. With a step into the staff room, he gently but firmly said, "I think we ought to move this conversation to my office."

* * *

 **Please feel free to leave a review and tell me what you think!  
Sarah x**


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